Morning journal and courier., 1887-05-07
MILLIONS FROM sHILL1NGs GROW

How Senator Stanford of California Earned HIS First Money-How He
 Escaped Being an Editor and a Poor Man.
 Senator Leland Stanford of California, the possessor of more millions than he knows what to do with, gives the following account of the first money he ever earned for him self and of his early business life:
 was farmers son and I lived on my fathers farm in the Mohawk valley, between Albany and Schenectady, on what was then known as the Consaul road. There were three brothers of us. I was about six years old at the time. My father was contractor
 and was absent from home good deal of the
 time, leaving the place in charge of the gar
 dener, who went to the market at Sehenecta-
 dy twice week with a wagon load of vege-
 tables to sell at the market One day my
 brothers and myself gathered lot of horse-
 radish in the garden, washed it clean and
 sent it to market with the rest of the vegeta-
 bles. When he came home at night the gar
 dener handed us six York shillings, which
 was the profit of our produce, and We dlvl-
 ded it evenly, each of us having two shil-
 lings. That the first money I ever
 earned, and I never see a boy trying to earn
 few pennies without feeling 8 renewed
 qualification at my success in that endeavor.
 My next financial endeavor was in 1881 or
 1882. We boys were in the habit of gather ing store of chestnuts every fall and put
 ting them in the garret for winters use.
 We managed that year to get together about five bushels. One day our hired man came home from market and told us as bit of gossip that chestnuts were worth five dollars a bushel in market. The next time the gar dener went to town we put what we had to- gether in grain bags and sent them in by | l~II .l.al and brought us home twenty-five dollars, which you perhaps can understand was a large sum of money for boys of our age in those days when grown men were working for two shillings day. Until I went to Al
 bany to study law in 1S46 when was twen- ty-two years of age, I attended the country schools and picked up the rudiments of an education in them. Iu the summer worked on a farm and at times assisted my father in his contracts, seeing a little of the world around me. One winter, when was about eighteen years old, and a stout, vigorous boy, my father bought tot of woodland and told me that if I would cut the timber off I might have the proceeds. I went to work with will and cut two thousand six hundred cords that winter-not alone, but with the assi stance of some men 1 hired. When the wood was cut hauled 1t to town and sold it to the Mohawk and Hudson River railroad, now part of the New York Cen tral system. I made profit of one dollar a cord on the transaction and found myself the possessor of two thousand six hundred dol lars.
 After finishing my studies in the office of Wheaton Doolittle & Hadley in Albany, and being admitted to the bar, got the western fever and started with another young man to the northern part of Wisconsin. l was not very successful as lawyer and used to write on political and other subjects, and took 8 great interest in the village debating society l and local politics. Several of my fellow townsmen who were similarly inclined joined | with me in organizing a company for the l purpose of publishing a paper. I had 8 | very narrow escape from becoming an editor. l We learned that there was press and an l outfit of type for sale in Milwaukee, which l could be had for seven hundred dollars. It was long and tedious ride, and you may imagine my disappointment upon my arrival at my destination to find that the press and ! outfit had been sold few days before. The l enterprise was abandoned. I went back to the law. but soon after had another misfor- tune. The building in which I had my of fee burned, and with it all my law books and worldly possessions. 1 was almost help less then and gladly accepted an invitation from my brothers to join them in California. This was in 1852, four years after the discov- cry of gold on the Pacific slope, and packing up the few things had left, I set out over land to the Goleonda. Arriving there I set- tied in a little town called Michigan Bluffs, ! in the mercantile business, and three years later removed to San Francisco, where l have since lived.